College Basketball Notebook

On Jan. 27, at a sold-out Lee Amphitheater in New Haven, Yale hosted Harvard for one of the most anticipated regular-season games in recent Ivy League history. For Yale, it played out in forgettable, even embarrassing, fashion. Harvard won, 65-35, delivering a blow to the Bulldogs' dreams of a league championship and NCAA Tournament appearance.

But not the final blow. The teams meet again Saturday in Cambridge, Mass., and because of the way Yale has responded, the rematch could mean as much as, if not more than, the first meeting. Yale is 16-6, 6-2 in the Ivy, in second place behind Harvard (21-3, 7-1).

"We laid an egg and that was extremely disappointing because the stars were aligned for us to play well," Yale coach James Jones said of last month's loss. "It was as good an atmosphere as I had ever seen, and to play poorly was really disappointing."

But a lot of basketball remained, and since then Yale has shown why this year's team is regarded as one of the best under Jones, the dean of Ivy coaches in his 13th year. The Bulldogs responded to the Harvard loss with home victories over Dartmouth, Penn and Princeton. Harvard, meanwhile, continued to cruise, undefeated heading into the Friday-Saturday games of last week.

On Friday, Yale lost in overtime at Cornell and Harvard won at Penn. But on Saturday, Yale pulled back within a game, erasing a 21-point, second-half deficit to defeat Columbia as Harvard lost at Princeton. According to Yale, it was the 18th-biggest second-half comeback in Division I history and the third-largest in Ivy history. That helped set the stage for Saturday's rematch, which will carry a lot of Ivy weight if Yale can win Friday at last-place Dartmouth (4-20, 0-8). Harvard hosts Brown (7-18, 1-7) Friday.

"We're lucky and happy to still be in the race," Jones said. "Trying to win the league is all we have because there's no conference tournament. It's good to still have an opportunity. If we win out, we control our own destiny."

Yale hasn't made the NCAA Tournament since 1962. The Bulldogs finished in a first-place tie with Princeton and Penn in 2002, and lost a playoff game to Penn, winding up in the NIT. Harvard hasn't made it since 1946. Last season, the Crimson finished tied for first and lost a playoff game to Princeton — at Lee Amphitheater.

"The Harvard game, I don't know if the moment was bigger than maybe what we were ready for," Jones said. "Harvard, having played Princeton in the building, with that kind of atmosphere, they may have been more ready than we were. Our defense wasn't terrible, but our offense was poor. The good thing is it opened our eyes to things we wanted to work on. There was such disappointment in the guys, and they came out a little sluggish [the next day] against Dartmouth. It took some convincing, but they're young guys, they forget pretty quickly."

Greg Mangano was 8-for-16 and scored 17 points for Yale. The rest of the team shot 5-for-25, and Yale had 22 turnovers. Jones was hesitant to praise Mangano, saying that someone had to score and that Mangano, averaging 18.4 points, will post similar numbers against any team. Jones was more worried that Mangano had just four rebounds (he's averaging 9.6).

Basically, Yale will have to be better in all areas Saturday, starting with taking care of the ball. All in all, though, it's been a solid season for Yale, and for Mangano, who is considered to have borderline NBA potential — just like Jeremy Lin did coming out of Harvard.

"His future is unlimited," Jones said of Mangano. "He's certainly going to get paid to play basketball in some league. He's got talent and has gotten much better, and he can still get better. He can get bigger and stronger. He has great hands, great feet, great instincts and a nice jump shot. All those things make him a good player. But the bigger and stronger is going to be a big part of what he does. At the next level, he won't be able to rely on his length to rebound the ball."

Little East, Big Batle

Tuesday was a pivotal night in Little East men's basketball, with the top four teams in the league facing each other. Rhode Island College defeated Western Connecticut, 79-78. Eastern Connecticut defeated Keene State on the road, 65-62.

And, now, with one game remaining for each team, Eastern (19-5, 10-3) and Keene State (18-6, 10-3) are tied for first place, and Western (19-5, 9-4) and Rhode Island College (19-5, 9-4) are tied for second.

On Saturday, Eastern plays at UMass-Boston, Western hosts Plymouth State and Keene State plays at Rhode Island College. The regular season conference champion, and/or the top seed, hosts the conference tournament.

"It's such a good conference," Eastern coach Bill Geitner said. "We feel great. We would feel better if we had it wrapped up, but with one game to go, we control our own destiny."

Eastern split the season series with Keene but would hold the tiebreak advantage if Western finishes third with a victory over Plymouth.